Hard on the heels of the Pope’s Motu Proprio about the
old Mass comes the reiteration from the Vatican that the
Roman Catholic Church is the one true Church established
by Jesus Christ. The document entitled “Responses to
Some Questions Regarding Certain Aspects of the
Doctrine on the Church” was published by the
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and signed by
Cardinal Levada with Bishop Angelo Amato cosigning, the
Pope having first ratified it. The document says nothing
new, but as indicated above is a reiteration of truths taught
by the Church.
The first question asks if the Second Vatican Council
changed Catholic Doctrine of the Church. The short
answer is: no. The second and third questions deal with
the affirmation that the Church of Christ subsists in the
Catholic Church and the specific meaning of the words
“subsists in.”
The document cites the Dogmatic
Constitution “Lumen Gentium” which defines “subsistence”
to mean the “perduring, historical continuity and the
permanence of all the elements instituted by Christ in the
Catholic Church, in which the Church of Christ is concretely
found on earth.”
Recognizing that the Church of Christ can be present,
and at work in other denominations not in full union with the
Catholic Church, the document states that the word
“subsists” can only be attributed to the Catholic Church
precisely because it refers to the mark of unity we profess
in the symbols of the faith . . .”
The fourth and fifth questions deal with other Christian
denominations, namely the Orthodox Churches and the
Protestant ecclesial communities. We use the term
“Church” for the Oriental Churches separated from full
communion with the Catholic Church because they enjoy
Apostolic Succession with true sacraments including the
priesthood and the Eucharist. On the other hand, the
Christian Communities “born out of the reformation of the
sixteenth century,” do not enjoy Apostolic Succession, and
thus do not have a sacramental priesthood and so “have
not preserved the genuine and integral substance of the
Eucharistic Mystery.” For this reason they “cannot,
according to Catholic Doctrine, be called ‘Churches’ in the
proper sense.”
Do Protestants and Orthodox agree with this? NO – that
is why they are not Catholic. To say that this document is
not oecumenical is to miss the point. This document does
not deal with oecumenism but rather with Catholic Doctrine.
Oecumenism focuses on what we have in common as
Christians, but should not seek to gloss over vital and
crucial differences. We do ourselves and non-Catholics no
favours in pretending that our differences either do not exist
or do not matter. While we should seek unity where we
can, we should never do so at the sacrifice of even the
smallest part of Catholic Doctrine lest we ourselves fall
away from the Truth.